How quaint " record of the time Lies here for our delight, Burlesqued in lively prose anil thyme, Or sketched in black and white! Year in, year out, from tide to tide, As change and d This jester, Has ridiculed and cheered us.
Here History leaves the suber vein In which her tale she tells, And pipes a more diverting strai
Her dusty facts, her periods dry, Adtired in cap and bells; No more she brings to vote us, But bids the vanished past yo by Tu comic wise before us Across the picture page, Still court derision or applause, Still win rebuffs or prizes, Discourse, declaim, and plead the cause Tu countless odd disguises.
How brave a galaxy they make, With all their far-off Hghts! 'What recollections they awake Of stormy Commons' nights? From Bright and Russell, Pam and Peel, To Randolph bold and busy, Or Gladstone, fain to test the steel, Week after week, of Dizzy.
Customs and crazes long forgot, Old fads that once were new, Here meet the shafts of satire shot At Folly as it flew.
The chignons and the crinolines,"
Phe croquet-playing fashion, The with ete with his blues aod greens, The china-maniac's passion.
As withered petals shelf Still guard in w snows. Hid in some ern delf, So flowers of wit, once fresh and green, Now tied in faded bunches Still hold a frag The leaves of ancient Punches.
ALrKeD Cocurays, in the London " World."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.